Keim, a Regents professor of biology and director of the Pathogen and Microbiome Institute at Northern Arizona University, shared his experience in forensics with fellow biology professor Frank von Hippel<\/strong>, an ecotoxicologist who hosts the monthly Science History Podcast. The conversation covered a range of such detective work that included a Japanese doomsday cult, the Soviet bioterrorism program and a rash of anthrax deaths among Scottish heroin addicts.<\/p>\n \u201cPaul\u2019s research history is so fascinating because he\u2019s worked on all of these cases where forensic science is needed, using genomics to solve international problems in infectious diseases,\u201d von Hippel said. \u201cHe\u2019s done so many things in the last few decades\u2014important political events and news events that had a significant scientific element to them. That\u2019s what I wanted to tackle in this episode.\u201d<\/p>\n Keim notes that \u201cin a \u2018live-fire\u2019 situation, we were applying cutting-edge technology to a real-world problem and having to create new science to meet the challenge.\u201d<\/p>\n During the 90-minute episode, Keim talks about his work with the FBI and the criminal justice system in the 1990s, which made him one of their first calls when anthrax showed up and federal investigators didn\u2019t know the source. He recalls meeting the Gulfstream at the Flagstaff airport and taking the spores, which had been extracted from the first victim, back to his NAU lab. His team determined the spores came from a laboratory strain in the United States, not from an international enemy.<\/p>\n While that didn\u2019t answer all the questions around the attack, which included anthrax spores being sent through the post office to news outlets and legislators, the discovery did drastically alter the conversation. Keim was a part of the global anthrax research community and was friends with the man eventually accused of perpetrating the attack\u2014a chilling realization he recounts on the podcast.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m pretty good at keeping secrets, but this was one secret I didn\u2019t want to tell anybody,\u201d he told von Hippel.<\/p>\n Keim and von Hippel discuss the laboratory-cultivated Ames strain of Bacillus anthracis<\/em>, which is named for Ames, Iowa, but is not from Ames; how he developed a test that is able to identify that strain from any other strain in the world, even though the differences are miniscule; and where the \u201ccrime scene\u201d was in the anthrax attacks, which allowed law enforcement to determine who were victims of bioterrorist attacks and who were affected by natural outbreaks of anthrax, which happen regularly in nature. (How anthrax spreads from dead animals to humans can be unpleasant.)<\/p>\n The podcast, which von Hippel started more than a year ago and now has listeners in more than 70 countries, is intended both to embrace his love of science history and to encourage science literacy among listeners.<\/p>\n \u201cScience plays such a powerful role in shaping events of critical importance to national security and to our personal lives, so it\u2019s great for people to have an understanding of what\u2019s actually happening in the labs that leads to these outcomes,\u201d he said. \u201cI think for most people the science is a black box.\u201d<\/p>\n The next episode, which will be released March 11, takes a look at game theory and cooperation and how international cooperation is rarely a zero-sum game While some episodes are just about fun science topics, von Hippel\u2019s primary goal is to equip listeners with the scientific understanding they need as they consider the difficult topics facing the world today.<\/p>\n \u201cThere are so many things going on, including all of these things for which people need to have a good understanding of science,\u201d he said. \u201cHopefully, the podcast is a fun way for people to become better informed about science and understanding the history of discoveries.\u201d<\/p>\n To listen to this and other episodes, including with Nobel Laureate Peter Agre, visit the Science History Podcast website<\/a> or subscribe to the podcast on any podcasting app. Follow along on Twitter @sci_history<\/a>. Follow Keim on Twitter @PaulKeim<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"![\"Paul](\"http:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wordpresst\/uploads\/sites\/153\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/01\/keim_img_5268_29419867782_o.jpg\")
<\/a><\/a> but instead an opportunity to benefit both sides of an agreement. It\u2019s timely given political tensions around the world, he said. The guest, using his own research, argues for the importance of taking a cooperative stance in international relations.<\/p>\n